The position of the Priory, close to the Palace of the Bishop of Winchester, led to the Church becoming the scene of many important historical events. Just as Blackfriars was used for political Functions; just as Wyclyf was tried in St. Paul's Cathedral, so St. Mary Overies was used on occasions when the Bishop of Winchester had to do with the matter in hand. Thus, two great marriages were solemnised in this Church. One was that of Edmund Holland, Earl of Kent, in 1406, with Lucia, daughter of the Lord of Milan. The bride was given away by Henry IV., and her dowry was 100,000 ducats. At her death she left the canons 6,000 crowns for the good of her soul and that of her husband. The other marriage was one of far greater importance. It was that of James the First, King of Scotland, the most pleasing figure in Scottish history, a poet and a scholar, of whom Drummond of Hawthornden wrote that 'of former Kings it might be said that the nation made the Kings, but of this King, that he made the people a nation.' He married in 1424, being then thirty years of age, after a captivity of nineteen years, Joan, or Johanna, daughter of the Earl of Somerset, and niece of Cardinal Beaufort. She was a cousin, therefore, of King Henry IV. The royal pair rode forth to Scotland laden with such gifts of plate and cloth of gold as Scotland had never before seen. They were accompanied by the Cardinal and his brother, the Duke of Exeter. Twelve years later, the King was murdered in the presence of his wife, who was wounded in trying to save him, a sad ending to a marriage of love, and a tragic widowhood to the woman whom her poet had called The fairest and the freshest younge flower That e'er I saw, methought, before that hour. [Illustration: NORTH-EAST VIEW OF ST. SAVIOUR'S, SOUTHWARK, 1800]